Archive: 20 June – 26 June 2011

Dr Evan Harris, the former Liberal Democrat MP, describes the government's revised NHS plans in a leaked email as 'bad'. Photograph: Graham Turner for the Guardian

The "Yellow Bastards", as the Tories now call the Liberal Democrats, are still not happy with the government's NHS reforms plans.

In a leaked email the former Lib Dem MP Evan Harris, who has led the charge against the original Andrew Lansley blueprint, has condemned the revised plans as "bad".

This is what Harris wrote in the email, part of an email chain seen by the Guardian:

There is a view that we should keep quiet, say we had a victory and hope no-one notices this stuff - but I think that is not realistic. The plans remain bad for the NHS, go beyond the coalition agreement and we must insist on sovreignty (sic) of conference on major issues not in the CA [coalition agreement].

Angela Merkel and David Cameron, speaking at the EU summit in October, are said to have reached an informal deal over EU bailouts. Photograph: Francois Lenoir/Reuters

David Cameron has barely put a foot wrong on Europe since his appointment as prime minister last year.

With the help of Kim Darroch, Britain's fiendishly clever permanent representative to the EU, the prime minister has steered clear of a series of pitfalls at EU summits. Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, and Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, have been noticeably friendly to Cameron after he dropped plans after the election to demand the repatriation of social and employment laws.

But Cameron may be heading for a rocky ride at the two day EU summit which opens in Brussels this afternoon. Two items are likely to cause grief:

I was surprised this week to open my newspapers and learn that Brian Haw, the anti-war protester on the pavement in Parliament Square, had both died and become a national hero to many people – a symbol of bloody-minded British liberty.

Obituaries appeared in several newspapers. G2 awarded him a cover story by Andy Beckett. Websites and blogs were full of praise for his principled stand alongside expressions of loathing for the political class in general.

Harriet Harman is leading the international development review. Photograph: David Levene for the Guardian

After his election as Labour leader, Ed Miliband gave his party 'a blank sheet of paper' on policy. He commissioned policy reviews in 19 areas. We're asking you to help Labour fill in that blank sheet. What do you think Labour should stand for on international development?

David Cameron, pictured with an electric car in 2006, rebranded the Conservatives as a green party but a background of climate scepticism in his party is restraining his ambition. Photograph: Andrew Parsons/PA

Damian Carrington: A mutiny by MEPs against action on global warming is only the latest bruising fight for David Cameron. But the battle to win Tory hearts is deeply damaging the battle to save the planet

David Cameron said at his Downing Street press conference that Britain would take no part in any second EU bailout of Greece. Photograph: Peter Macdiarmid/Getty Images

Why is David Cameron so confident that Britain will not have to take part in any EU element of a second bailout of Greece?

Prime ministers need to be on firm ground if they are to declare three days before a European summit, as Cameron did at his press conference this morning, that a red line will not be crossed. They need to have extraordinary confidence to make such a declaration when Britain has no national veto in the matter under consideration.

But that is exactly what the prime minister did when he said that Britain would not be joining any second EU bailout of Greece. Britain would stump up, he said, but only as part of its IMF obligations:

Wasn't David Cameron on top of his game when he staged a rare No 10 press conference on Tuesday? Plenty of contradictions smoothed over, plenty of pandering to the redtop agenda (but not too much) and extra public spending unveiled, but all of it deftly handled by the man in the dark blue suit and smart matching tie.

Homeowners who use "reasonable force" to defend themselves from burglars will not be prosecuted either. That's the current law actually, but who's counting? Cameron promises to clarify uncertainties, but I'm sure that folk won't be able to shoot them in the back on the lawn. Let's see if the Sun and Mail buy the No 10 line tomorrow. Continue reading...

Iain Duncan Smith, the work and pensions secretary, will be defending the pension reforms today. Photograph: Oli Scarff/Getty Images

As MPs gear up to debate pension reform Labour is busy taking the mickey out of coalition ministers over the muddle they are making of their policy. And why not when Danny Alexander, the Lib Dem Treasury minister, angered already irate unions with a pre-emptive decision on the pensions deal they thought they were still negotiating?

Such things happen in government all the time, as they do in the private sector, and it might be funny if it wasn't serious. The Tory tabloids – Tory broadsheets too – have been beating the war drum about the prospect of public sector strike action over pensions for months.

Today school pupils are threatening to join in, which must be the first serious display of concern over pension rights ever shown by teenagers. Normally even 50-year-olds are pretty casual (I know, I've been one), so we could regard it as a positive development.